Part II of heritage volunteer Pete Slater’s trilogy of articles based on his research into football fanzine history. You can hear Pete talk about that research at a research showcase coming up on June 26 – part of the programme for the Voice of the Fans exhibition, a co-production from Leeds Libraries and the British Library.

You can also browse the full event programme

As part of the discussions about the Voice of the Fans exhibition on football fanzines and culture I started thinking about how many fanzines there had been. I assumed that this would be an easy task and was sure a list would already exist, surely someone had thought “I’ll make a list of every football fanzine that existed, including its price, start and end dates, anecdotes about the fanzine, links to copies still available and if it moved online.” You know where I’m heading with this, a Sisyphean task, it took a year to ‘complete’ (it will never be complete). So how did the list ‘arrive’? Come with me down this rabbit hole.

Level 1: The internet

Google is ‘great’ but. in many ways, it became a relief when this message (above) popped up, at least you knew that your search for Denbigh FC fanzine Billy’s Worst Nightmare could probably stop right there. Google insisting that you’re looking for a different word is also a problem. No, I don’t want to search for a Dumbarton FC FANZONE, I want the fanzine. A Dumbarton fanzone? The mind boggles.

Another problem is the number of similarly titled ‘things’ that appear in 50 years. Take Cockney Rebel, a Chelsea fanzine. Easy to find? Well, Steve Harley and his band would like a word about that. Fraserburgh’s fanzine The Happy Haddock might be out there but it’s four pages deep behind various chip shops round the country and I don’t have the energy.

Finally, there’s searching for fanzines like Plymouth’s long-lost Pasty News. I’m delighted that Friary Mill “are passionate about providing quality products for Argyle fans throughout Home Park Stadium”. But it wasn’t the result I was hoping for.

Beyond Google searches there are websites[1] that brought some new ones and about 300 fanzines were documented there. eBay has a surprising number of zines up for sale which helped prove existence of many names. But if you think the internet is infallible and easily reveals all, it doesn’t – and don’t search for ‘Foot and Mouth’ without making it very clear it’s the 1980s football catering fanzine you’re looking. Oh, and don’t get me started on AI!

Level 2: Print

In print there are partial lists in some old books[2]  and we’re grateful to the National Football Museum and National Library of Scotland for the list of fanzines in their excellent collections. Then there are back copies of When Saturday Comes (WSC), the best-known football fanzine of them all.

By June/July 1987 and issue 8, WSC was listing a publications column, fanzines and how to get all five of them. This lasted until May 2000 when over 400 were listed over two pages of small tightly packed text before a recently introduced column ‘Football on the web’ took over (it didn’t last!). A fantastic resource but wading through all the digital back copies for months still leaves gaps. Some fanzines had been and gone before WSC started listings and people had to let them know they were publishing, something that didn’t always happen.

Level 3: Forums/Twitter/Email
Various people were contacted and helped tremendously, there are some good lists and anecdotes of old fanzines on forums. At some point though you become glad when ‘no results found’ appears, trawling through arguments about a proposed 3^rd strip from decades ago gets tiring. Worryingly, the collective memory of fanzines is dying out, most conversations on this topic were over 10 years old.

However as news has seeped out about the exhibition I have been overwhelmed by the reaction of former and current editors and contributors to any and every request for help. There are too many to name here but to give you some idea I have been spending about an hour a day recently sifting through emails, adding details to ‘The List’ and generally just smiling with joy at the stories that are emerging. People like John Pearman, Dave Thomas, Matthew Kempson, Mark Kelly, Rob Nicholls, Simon Wright and so many more are still there, still keeping the flame alive and are voices to be cherished.

Level 4: Road Trip
With more reliable forms of transport than the Austin Princess I used to travel to games in, there are a surprising number of fanzine collections in academic institutions around the country. Perhaps the best of these is the National Library of Scotland (NLS) and their frankly incredible collection of Scottish fanzines. I can highly recommend a visit but, for obvious reasons, some of these archives are not stored on site – make sure you get in touch and book the fanzine for viewing at least 48 hours in advance.

Other excellent ‘local’ collections are located at: Carlisle University, University College Cork, York University, British Library London, Exeter University archive, the Bishopsgate Institute, Leeds Central Library, People’s Collection Wales (online), National Football Museum in Manchester, Dundee FC Historical Society and the Charlton FC Museum (matchdays only). In a surreal twist there is also a very good collection of largely Shrewsbury fanzines at the De Paul University in Chicago, I’m sure there are many more.

The Final Whistle
Creating the list has taken an incredible amount of effort but has been supremely rewarding and yes, absolutely worth it. For the first time it will allow people to easily look up details like dates of the first and last issue, number, where copies are stored, if a fanzine is still around in some form and all sorts of other wonderful facts; Why the Dalry Thistle fanzine was called the China’s for example.

It has brought back great memories of fanzines, the incredible amount of humour, and creativity they contained plus the power and strength of organised protest they demonstrated. Finally, I hope it brings the realisation to more people what a fantastic, diverse, underused and unappreciated resources libraries are.

Football fanzines are still around with 69 still in print. Go out and find them – or come and see us physically at the Central Library; metaphorically via the blogs at https://footballfanzineculture.blog; or on the socials: Facebook or Bluesky @fanzinefc.bsky.social

*At time of publication, the list features almost 1,700 individual football fanzine titles. Get in touch with us at the Central Library, or directly with Pete via his blog, to access the latest version of the list

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[1] https://footybits.co.uk/, https://thefanzinedirectory.co.uk/football-fanzine-list/

[2] Steve Redhead’s “Post-Fandom and the Millennial Blues”